Mastering Wartime

by Gallman, J. Matthew

• ISBN13: 9780812217445
• ISBN10: 0812217446
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2000-08-15
• Publisher: Univ of Pennsylvania Pr

Summary

Mastering Wartimeis the first comprehensive study of a Northern city during the Civil War. J. Matthew Gallman argues that, although the war posed numerous challenges to Philadelphia's citizens, the city's institutions and traditions proved to be sufficiently resilient to adjust to the crisis without significant alteration. Following the wartime actions of individuals and groups-workers, women, entrepreneurs-he shows that while the war placed pressure on private and public organizations to centralize, Philadelphia's institutions remained largely decentralized and tradition bound. Gallman explores the war's impact on a wide range of aspects of life in Philadelphia. Among the issues addressed are recruitment and conscription of soldiers, individual responses to wartime separation and death, individual and institutional benevolence, civic rituals, crime and disorder, government contracting, and long-term economic development. The book compares the wartime years to the antebellum period and discusses the war's legacies in the postwar decade.

Author Biography

J. Matthew Gallman is Henry R. Luce Professor of the Civil War Era at Gettysburg College and author of Receiving Erin's Children: Philadelphia, Liverpool, and the Irish Famine Migration, 1845-1855.

Table of Contents

List of tables	vii
Preface and acknowledgments	ix
Introduction	1	(10)
Filling the ranks	11	(43)
Kinfolk at war: Philadelphians responses to death and separation	54	(31)
Old rituals for new causes: Civic celebration at war	85	(32)
Help from the home front: Wartime voluntarism in Philadelphia	117	(29)
The Great Sanitary Fair of 1864: Exercise in civic voluntarism	146	(24)
Preserving the peace: Order and disorder	170	(24)
Soldiers in the city: The military challenge to public order	194	(23)
Philadelphia's workers in wartime	217	(34)
The fortunes of war: The Civil War and Philadelphia's manufacturing development	251	(15)
The economic life of wartime Philadelphia	266	(33)
Winners and losers: The R. G. Dun credit reports	299	(30)
Conclusion: Toward the Centennial City	329	(12)
Appendix: The R. G. Dun data	341	(3)
Bibliographic essay	344	(6)
Index	350